1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to radio communications, and, more particularly, to techniques of detecting a particular burst in a communication system.
In the General Packet Radio Service (GPRS)/Enhanced GPRS (EGPRS) system, uplink/downlink carrier is divided into radio frames and each frame is divided into eight time slots. A physical channel is a specified time slot in consecutive frames. There are five bursts that may be transmitted, which are normal burst, frequency correction burst, synchronization burst, dummy, and access burst. A base station (BS) transmits a dummy burst as filler in unused uplink/downlink carrier timeslots. Because the structure of a dummy burst is similar to a normal burst, detecting a dummy burst (or normal burst) may be important in GPRS/EGPRS systems.
For example, USF (uplink Status Flag) information in a normal burst transmitted by a base satiation may notify users able to transmit data on the uplink path in a specific time slot of the next frame. If a user misinterprets a dummy burst as a normal burst, an invalid USF is generated adversely affecting the data transmission rate and potentially dropping the connection. Thus, the ability to distinguish between a dummy burst and a normal burst is desirable.